I overheard a phone conversation to learn that a certain handicapped person’s toilet seat was broken. I volunteered to run by on my way to work and put a new one on right quick. I knew it would only take a few minutes and I would be gone. I went across town to the location and saw the size, type, and color and went back across town to Home Depot in Benton to pick one up. Because of the way it was mounted on the handicap fixture, I decided that instead of it having plastic hinges like the broken one, I would get one that had metal hinges so it would hold up better. I went to the selection of toilet seats, saw the metal hinged one hanging over its bin of boxed seats, raised it up, grabbed a box, and took off to pay for it. I was wasting no time. I will “git ‘er done” so I can drive on to Arkadelphia and go to work. When I got back to the house and pulled the new seat out of its box, I was irritated to only discover that the seat had plastic hinges (a customer or someone had placed the wrong seat in that bin) and the holes in the tubular structure of the handicap toilet seat frame were not quite large enough to receive the new screws. With a twinge of exasperation, I drilled the holes slightly larger, and when I mounted the seat I saw that by design, the way this seat mounted, it would not take long for it to break also. So I removed it, drove back across town, and made sure, by the numbers, that I was getting the right seat. I went back across town, got the seat installed satisfactorily, and finally went on to work. When I grabbed the first seat I assumed it was the right seat in the box because it was in the bin under the metal hinged seat. I did not check the numbers.
We can assume that our spiritual life is OK because we feel like we are OK and have a sense of peace. (We can sit in a hen house for 20 years, but that doesn’t make us a chicken.) We need to check the numbers on the package to make sure they correspond with the numbers on the lid. We need to check our life out with what the Word says to make sure we are right with God the Bible way, and in the full blessing of what Jesus Christ has done for us. With the steel of the Word as our confidence, we have a source of strength to hold up under the pressure. Plus, when that day comes when we cross over to the other side, that same source of strength in the Lord will be our place of refuge and blessing for all eternity. It pays eternal dividends to go by what is written.
